Back to Good
by Padfoot04
Summary: Five years after graduating Hogwarts, Neville and his wife Ginny have lost touch with their old friends. Now Neville remembers what happened in his seventh year and beyond, and something unexpected brings the six friends together again.


**Back to Good:**

_"Everyone here knows everyone here is thinking about somebody else_

_And it's best if we all keep this under our heads_

_I couldn't tell if anyone here was feeling the way I do_

_But I'm lonely now, and I don't know how_

_To get it back to good"_ – Back 2 Good by Matchbox Twenty

_GMW+NAL … GW+NL … Neville Augusta Longbottom + Ginerva Molly Weasley … Ginerva Molly Weasley-Longbottom_ – Neville laughed softly as he read the last one. _Weasley-Longbottom_ – even in his fourth year of Hogwarts, he'd known she'd never drop her last name. And he hadn't wanted her to. He'd finally decided to go through the old boxes of junk and sort it all out. He'd been working for the last few days, and he wanted to get through that box before he had to leave for … well, before he had to leave.

He'd kept all his old Hogwarts books and notes, and it turned out there were quite a few of them. Going though them, he was glad Ginny was too busy with her job as a reporter for the Daily Prophet to help him clean. She would have helped him more, but she'd been busy for the last few weeks covering the recent Death Eater attacks. They'd been more active than usual lately, more active than they'd been since Voldemort's defeat. Of course, at that moment, Ginny wasn't at work. She was downstairs, and she'd said she wanted to be alone.

Neville sighed, and continued going though the papers. His job as a Herbologist didn't take up as much time, so he'd had time to sort stuff out. He was glad Ginny was too busy working to see all the doodles on his old Hogwarts notes, all the hearts with their initials in them. Things had been so easy back then. At the Yule Ball, where he'd first fallen for Ginny, he'd been on top of the world. For weeks afterwards, he'd filled pages with hearts and Ginny's name. Once, to his embarrassment, Professor Snape had caught him drawing Ginny. Neville shuddered at the memory. But all that had passed.

Neville's Hogwarts notes took him back in time, back to when they'd all been friends, back before … before the Death Eater attacks. Oh, there had been Death Eater attacks back then. There had been many, and with devastating results. But somehow, Neville and his comrades had made it though alive. There had been some major shocks –Luna's dad, and, to Neville's horror, his gran had had close calls with the Death Eaters. But somehow, they'd all survived. Many people had said it was a miracle that none of them had been killed. For Neville and his partners in the battle, the only casualty had been their friendship. But that had been his fault, not Voldemort's… In irritation, Neville pushed that thought out of his mind. Thinking about it did no good.

Neville got through the boxes from his earlier years at Hogwarts, and found the stuff from the seventh year. That had been the year Harry, Ron and Hermione had gone off hunting Horcruxes. Neville, Ginny and Luna had grown closer, and all three of them had kept in contact with the trio. That year, they'd supported them as best they could. Neville, Ginny and Luna had constantly sent letters of encouragement, and they'd done as much as they could from Hogwarts. They'd spent hours in the library, doing research so they'd have some more information for the three heroes on the Horcrux hunt.

Neville could still remember the first battle he'd fought that year. Professor McGonagall had known Voldemort would take advantage of Dumbledore's death to send his strongest Death Eaters into Hogwarts, so she hadn't taken any chances. She'd had members of the Order of the Pheonix patrolling the school day and night.

**  
****Flashback**

Neville was sitting in the library with Ginny and Luna. They were supposed to be finding information on how to make oneself temporarily immune to fire, as the trio had sent them a letter saying they'd found a fire that they thought there was a Horcrux behind, but they couldn't tell because they couldn't put out the flame. "This is useless!" said Ginny, tossing aside _Immunities for Idiots_. "This is just immunities to potions and curses. It can't be that hard –"

Suddenly, they heard a loud explosion, followed by screams of triumph. They all knew what it was, because they'd all been waiting for it to happen. They'd known the school's defences couldn't last forever – without Dumbledore there to constantly reinforce them, the Death Eaters would break through. Ginny screamed, Neville threw his book down in surprise and horror, and Luna stared out the window with fear, yet determination on her face. Quietly, she put down her book.

"I suppose we should go to the Astronomy Tower now," she said, though her voice shook. That had been the plan – they'd go to the highest point of the castle and fire curses down on the Death Eaters. The members of the Order would fight them on the ground, but Ginny, Neville and Luna's job would be to go to the tower. They knew they couldn't do much, and would stand very little chance on the ground, but they were going to help as best they could. If one or two Death Eaters broke free and headed for the doors to the school, they might be able to stun them from above.

The three students ran to the stairs and sprinted up them, taking them two at a time. When they got to the top, they saw a battle scene raging below them. Professor Lupin, Tonks, Mr and Mrs Weasley, Professor McGonagall, Kingsley, Hagrid and Moody were desperately trying to fight hooded figures, but they were outnumbered two to one. It took Neville several moments to realise not all the hooded figures were Death Eaters – they had Dementors with them, too.

_"EXPECTO PATRONUM!"_ roared Ginny, next to him. A sleek, silver tiger came out of her wand and galloped around the battle scene, scaring away one of the Dementors. It was soon joined by Neville's dog (he brought the memory of dancing with Ginny at the Yule Ball into his mind) and a strange creature of Luna's that Neville could only assume was a Snorckack. They fired stunning spells down onto the battle, coming close to hitting Order members several times. Six Death Eaters started running towards the doors, and, between them, Neville, Ginny and Luna managed to stun two of them. They had to let the other two go; they hoped Professors Flitwick and Sprout, who were stationed just inside the doors, would be able to take them. They kept fighting like that, firing as many spells as they could at the scene on the ground, until a stunning spell missed Ginny by inches.

Neville recognised the voice that screamed the incantation, he hated it more than he hated Voldemort himself. The voice was female, cold and triumphant. Bellatrix Lestrange was one of the four Death Eaters that had gotten into the school, and she'd obviously gotten past Professors Flitwick and Sprout.

_"Crucio!"_ roared Bellatrix, pointing her wand at Neville.

_"Expelliarmus!"_ shouted Luna at the same time. Bellatrix blocked the curse easily and rounded on her, as Neville fell, writing to the ground. Fury and hatred ran through him like blood in his veins. This was the woman – the spell that had destroyed his parents. This was the reason he had to visit them in St. Mungo's instead of talking to them at home. He stood up as Bellatrix turned to Luna and the curse lifted.

"_PROTEGO!_" screamed Luna as Bellatrix tried to stun her. Bellatrix laughed and raised her wand, but Neville was faster:

_"Stupfey!"_ Bellatrix blocked it over her shoulder, and Neville had to duck as the spell came back at him. He raised his wand again, ready to fire any curse at the Death Eater, when a red light missed her by inches. They all turned to see Harry, Ron and Hermione standing in the doorway, Harry having just preformed a non-verbal stunning spell. There was a fury in his eyes Neville had never seen before.

"So this is how you want to play it, Potter?" asked Bellatrix derisively. "Have you forgotten our last meeting already?" Neville remembered what the plan had been for meeting Bellatrix Lestrange. The Order had warned them that the Death Eaters were likely to get into the school, and they could probably take most of them. The three of them should be able to hold them off most of them until help arrived. Bellatrix Lestrange was a different story. She'd learned the most magic out of all of them from Voldemort himself. Fortunately, she was overconfident. She talked too much during battle. The plan was to keep her talking for as long as possible, and, while she was in the middle of a sentence, stun her with a non-verbal spell. Neville had spent hours practicing non-verbal stunning spells, and had finally mastered them. He watched Harry, waiting for the signal.

"Yes, as I recall you were beaten by six teenagers and never got the prophecy," said Harry coldly.

"My memory of the occasion is a little more detailed – I seem to recall something about my dear cousin and the veil –" Harry cast a swift, meaningful glance at the others in the room. Neville knew they were supposed to keep her talking, but he assumed Harry had given the signal out of fury at hearing her talk like that about Sirius. Knowing he had about a second, he screwed up his face and concentrated with all his might on a stunning spell. _STUPEFY!_ He let the word explode in his head, but kept his mouth tightly shut. A jet of red light flew out of his wand, joining the other five that were also going at her. Bellatrix had a split second to react.

"_Protego!_" Ron and Hermione's spells went glazing off to the side, but Bellatrix didn't have time to block all of them. She ducked, dodging Neville Ginny's spells, but Harry and Luna had aimed low enough to get close to her. Luna's spell brushed her leg, and she staggered, but it wasn't enough to knock her out completely. The moment it took for her to recover from being touched by the spell gave them all the time to fire more stunning spells, and this time Neville was close enough to her so the light from his wand travelled less than a foot to get to her. Again, she dodged it, and Neville grew desperate. Bellatrix raised her wand, when suddenly:

"_STUPEFY!_" Professors McGonagall and Lupin had burst into the room, and began duelling Bellatrix Lestrange. Professor Lupin told Harry, Ron, Hermione, Neville, Ginny and Luna to run, and they had to dodge curses on their way out the door.

"Harry!" shouted Ginny, as they ran down from the Astronomy Tower. "When did you guys get here?"

"Just now," replied Harry, not slowing down. "We heard about the attack on Hogwarts and we had to come. You three go back to the common room with the others; McGonagall increased the security there, and that's where the students are supposed to be. Ron, Hermione and I have to go and fight."

"Don't be stupid," gasped Ginny, as they reached the bottom of the stairs. "We're coming with you." Neville and Luna said they were coming too, and Harry didn't have the time or the energy to argue. They burst outside, and joined the Order in the fight against the Death Eaters that were left. The Order had been outnumbered, but they had the advantage of fighting the battle on their territory. They were slowly pushing the Death Eaters back, gaining ground a few metres at a time. Many of the Death Eaters had already been stunned or forced to leave the grounds and Disapparate, and those that remained were backing towards the gates. With so many Death Eaters gone, it was an even fight.

Neville ran into the fight, and began firing curses blindly. "_Stupefy_ – _Stupefy_ – _STUPEFY!_" He fired stunning spells at all the hooded figures he could find. The Dementors had been scared away by patronuses, so they were just fighting the Death Eaters. Out of the corner of his eye, Neville saw a jet of red light flying at Ginny. "_Protego!_" he yelled, deflecting it off to the side. The Death Eater that had tried to attack her rounded on Neville instead, and Neville only just had time to block the stunning spell coming straight at him.

The battle continued like this for about ten minutes of firing curses wherever he could, reminding Neville unpleasantly of the battle at the end of the year before. Finally, they chased the Death Eaters off their territory. They ran off the grounds and Disapparated. Professors Lupin and McGonagall came out several minutes later to say Bellatrix Lestrange had escaped. Harry, Ron and Hermione stood just outside the gates to Hogwarts, talking to Neville, Ginny and Luna before they left.

"Thanks so much for the letters," said Harry.

"Yes, I don't know what we'd have done without all your information," added Hermione. "That fire is a tricky one, but we're hoping to crack it soon. Voldemort put some kind of spell on it to make it impossible to put out, and the basic fire-immunity potions and spells just don't work. Your help is really useful, so thanks. Thanks for the support, too."

They talked for a little while longer, and then Harry, Ron and Hermione Disapparated.  
**End Flashback**

Over the next year, they'd fought many battles like that. Security had increased and the battles lessened in quantity, but the Death Eaters still invaded about once a month. Fortunately, that first battle was the last they saw of Bellatrix Lestrange on Hogwarts grounds all year. Voldemort sent his strongest Death Eaters to Hogwarts for the first battle, but sent weaker and weaker ones each time after that. He was using his strongest Death Eaters and most of his time trying to kill Harry.

Meanwhile, Harry, Ron and Hermione had made steady progress in their Horcrux hunt. They'd made themselves unplottable, and Harry was the secret keeper for the cave they were living in (they never said where the cave was in case their letters were intercepted). They'd come to all the Hogwarts battles they could, but they'd often had other things to do. Neville, Ginny and Luna had always started the battles from the top of the Astronomy Tower, but they'd rarely been there when the battle had finished.

As Neville went through the papers, years later, he found a lot of old letters from Harry, Ron and Hermione. He found the one thanking them for the information about how to survive fire (they'd found the immunity potion in a book Luna's father had given her), the one saying they were close to a Horcrux and would be going to get it the next day, the one saying they'd found and destroyed the locket (Regulus Black had re-hidden it), the one saying they were going to find Nagini, the one saying they'd killed the snake … he'd kept all the letters, but those were some of the most important.

Of course, all the letters were coded. Owls were too easily intercepted. They'd used T for "Voldemort" (it stood for "Tom Riddle" – V might be too easy to recognise), H for "Horcrux", HR for Death Eater (it was less easily recognisable than DE), D for Dementor, I for Inferi and even P for Harry, W for Ron, G for Hermione, Y for Ginny, L for Luna and N for Neville.

Neville paused to reread the letter that spoke of the Ravenclaw Horcrux. It asked about Luna's heritage, and the reply had been that her mother's family was descended from Rowen Ravenclaw herself. Some research done by the trio, with the help of Neville, Ginny and Luna showed that Luna was the rightful owner of one of the Horcruxes. They'd said that meant they'd had to have Luna help them find the Ravenclaw Horcrux – she had important information about it. They'd talked to Professor McGonagall, who'd understood why Luna had needed to go. They'd come on brooms to Hogwarts, had stopped for a quick talk with Neville and Ginny, and had left with Luna. And just like that, Luna had been gone from Hogwarts.

That had been in late January. After that, Neville and Ginny had been the only ones from the group left at Hogwarts. They'd spent most of their free time together, searching the library and old records of Tom Riddle and even the Gaunt family for anything that could help with the Horcrux hunt.

Naturally, as they'd spent more and more time together, they'd begun discussing things besides Voldemort and the Horcrux hunt. Ginny had talked to Neville about her relationship with Harry: the beginning, the middle and the end. She hadn't been in another relationship since. She'd asked Neville if there was any girl he had his eye on, and he'd always said there was no one. That wasn't true; he was still as crazy about Ginny as he'd been when he'd fallen for her at the Yule Ball. But he hadn't told her that. He'd never taken advantage of Harry and Ginny's temporary break-up; he'd never moved in on what he knew was Harry's girl. It was Ginny who'd made the first move.

**Flashback**

It was Friday, February 20th, 1998. Neville and Ginny had gone to the library to do some research for the Horcrux hunters, and they'd spent the evening there. When the library had closed, they'd brought their books back to the common room, where they'd continued going through them. After a while, they'd given up. It was a few minutes to midnight, and they sat together, staring into the fire. They were alone in the common room; everyone else had gone to bed.

They'd been talking for the last half hour or so, but they'd been quiet for the last few minutes. Neville broke the silence: "I wonder what the Horcrux hunters are doing right now."

"Probably resting up," replied Ginny. "They're going to that ocean tomorrow to look for Hufflepuff's cup." She sighed.

"I wish we could be there with them," said Neville, staring into the fire.

"We should be, but Harry's all noble about wanting to keep us out of danger. He let Ron and Hermione go with him," said Ginny with bitterness Neville hadn't heard before in her.

"He doesn't want us to get hurt," replied Neville, thinking he should defend him. "But I want to help. We can't do much from here."

Ginny sighed again. "Without being there, we can't really do anything. We can look through all the books we want, but the Horcruxes aren't in the library." She took her eyes off the fire, and turned to Neville. "You know, I can hardly remember what he looks like now. Sometimes I wonder what I saw in him."

Neville stared at her, shocked. He'd never heard Ginny talk like that before. She'd talked about how wonderful Harry Potter was since he'd started hanging out with her in his third year, and she'd talked to him about how wonderful their relationship was. Throughout his seventh year, she'd talked of her frustrations caused by not being with Harry, but she'd never implied she didn't like him anymore. Neville hesitated, and decided it was best not to answer. Better to keep his mouth shut than to say the wrong thing.

Ginny was quiet for a moment or so, and then said: "I mean, I fell for him before my first year had even started because he was so famous – he saved the world! And then I got to know him and my crush didn't go away, so I reckoned I liked him for his personality too. But now that I think about it, I can't remember why I liked him so much. He was brave and kind and everything, but I didn't know him that well. It's not that I dislike him; I just don't get shivers or anything like I used to when I thought of him. I see his flaws now, and I guess before I always assumed he didn't have any."

She was quiet for another moment, and then added: "I don't even know why I'm telling you all this. I'm sorry; I guess you're the only person I have with the Horcrux hunters gone. I've hardly spoken all year to my old friends outside the six of us."

Neville listened to all this in awe. Then, choosing his words very carefully, he said: "No, I like hearing about your thoughts. Maybe when you see Harry, it will all come back to you."

Ginny shook her head. "I don't think so." Then, with a sudden change of topic, she added: "This is a Hogsmeade weekend."

"I know," said Neville, "We're going to the Three Broomsticks together, right?" They'd agreed to go have a few Butterbeers, before heading back to the castle to see if they could find some more information for Harry, Ron, Hermione and Luna.

"I think we deserve a day off from the work," said Ginny. "Do you want to spend the whole day there? I haven't been to Zonko's in ages, and I think we could both do with a laugh. When was the last time we pranked Pansy Parkinson?"

"October, remember?" said Neville. "You put that Blabbing Beverage in her pumpkin juice."

"Well, that was too long ago," replied Ginny, as though that settled the matter. "We're spending the day there."

"All right," said Neville, pleased about that. "But we have to get home in time for me to work on that Dementor essay for Professor Lupin."

"You can do that on Sunday; I'll help you," replied Ginny. Then, a cloud of worry that Neville didn't know what to make of passed over her face. She turned so she was looking straight into Neville's eyes: "Do you want to go … with me?" she asked quietly.

Not for the first time that evening, Neville stared at her in shock. Had Ginny Weasley just asked him out? No, he was crazy. She didn't mean that. "Well, we're going together, aren't we?" he said.

"No," clarified Ginny, "I mean you actually going with me. Like…" She stopped, and Neville saw from her face she was extremely nervous. It didn't suit her. Girls that took on everything from Death Eaters to Fred and George did not get nervous around guys like Neville. Ginny should be breathing fire at anything that dared attempt to make her nervous; not hiding from it. "Like a date."

Inside, Neville started having a panic attack. Ginny Weasley had just asked him _out_ … Ginny _Weasley_ had just asked him out … _Ginny_ Weasley had just asked him out … Ginny Weasley had just asked _him_ out … Ginny Weasley had just _asked_ him out … Ginny Weasley _had_ just asked him out … whichever way he though of it, it seemed insane. Aloud, he said, "What about Harry?"

"I told you; that was never much more than a celebrity crush. I'm sick of waiting for Harry, especially when I'm having feelings for another boy. This is only if you want to, of course. I'm sorry if I'm putting too much pressure on you …" The nervousness crossed her face again, and Neville couldn't bear it.

He reassured her: "No, I want to go. I definitely do. If you're serious, the answer is yes."

Ginny smiled at him, and leaned closer. The arms of their chairs were touching, and she moved her hand so it was on his arm. "Of course I'm serious. And I'm going to do it right this time. I've seen your flaws, and I love them." She smiled.  
**End Flashback**


End file.
